Two-Step
by avocadomoon
Summary: "That was an emotional metaphor," Derek says. "I ate your face emotionally. Because I love you." [for falsettodrop]


When Casey thinks about her father, she pictures him at work, because really that's pretty much the only thing he ever did for most of Casey's life. She's heard rumors about a bowling league, before Lizzie was born, but she's skeptical. There are some old photos of him in an album her mom keeps on the highest shelf that allegedly contain evidence that he once had _college friends,_ but again - it's all hearsay. Casey can't really picture him retiring - it's just bizarre. What the hell is he going to _do_ with himself?

"Date?" Derek suggests. "You know, he hasn't really dated anybody since that one woman you didn't like, a couple years back. What was her name?"

Casey grits her teeth. "_Amanda._"

"Oh right." Derek laughs, nudging her shoulder. "Man, you _hated_ her. It was pretty funny."

Casey slaps his hand away. "I'm not opposed to him dating," she says, "I just think it's...strange, for him to take the retirement package now. I mean, he always said that he wanted to be partner for at least ten years - I remember him telling me that so many times, but then he jumps at the chance, the first time they offer it to him? He's only been partner for four. It's weird, right?"

Derek shrugs. "Maybe he's sick of it."

"Sick of work?" Casey barks out a laugh. "Yeah right."

Derek leans backward in his desk chair, propping one knee up against the side of the wood so he can make a face at her properly. "Case, the guy's fifty-five. He's got plenty of money, and he's worked sixty hours a week for how long? I mean, isn't that why your mom left him - because she never _saw_ him?"

"Yeah." Casey bites her lip. "I just thought - "

"Nope. Don't go there." Derek nudges her again, this time with the pen he yanks out from behind his ear. "Nothing's wrong with him. He doesn't have cancer, he doesn't hate you, and the sky isn't falling. Quit it."

Sometimes Casey really hates how easily he can tell what she's thinking. "Fine," she says, "but if he were dating somebody seriously then he would've told me, at least. Maybe not Mom and Liz, but he'd definitely tell me."

"Sure." Derek nods. "But if he _wanted_ to date - you know, find _someone _to hang out with for the second half of his life - retiring early and moving back to Toronto would be a great place to start."

Casey squirms a little. "He wants to be closer to us."

"Yeah, about time," Derek mutters. "Look, can we just choose something already? I need my laptop back, I've got to finish this thing for tomorrow."

"By 'thing,' I assume you mean 'super important pitch that you procrastinated on all week?'" Derek grumbles something inaudible, sitting up straight in his chair to squint at the screen. "Let's just get him some whiskey. He'll like that."

"We can't afford super nice whiskey, are you kidding?" Derek asks. "Case, the kind of shit your dad drinks - we're talking rent payment money, here."

"We could find him something more affordable?"

"No. He's a huge snob about it." Derek shakes his head. "Bad idea, trust me. I still say baseball tickets are the way to go."

Casey peers over his shoulder at the page that's still open on the browser - the Blue Jays schedule for this season. "_You_ just want to drag me to a baseball game," Casey accuses.

"I can get us good seats," Derek replies, ignoring her. "My office has a VIP account, anyone can use it. C'mon." He nudges her. "He'll like it. And you don't hate baseball as much as you hate football."

"I hate it a little," Casey says.

"We'll get him two - for you and him. Tell the family that my share of the gift is letting you use the VIP account," Derek continues. "That way it can be just you and your dad, and nobody will get weird about it. Yeah?" He grins at her, rising his voice in the annoying way he does when he's imitating her. "'Good idea, Derek, you're such a genius! Thank you so much, you're the best, most sexiest, handsomest man I've ever known - '"

"Most sexiest?" Casey repeats incredulously. "I cannot _believe_ you get paid to write for a living."

"Allegedly," Derek says, "if I don't finish this pitch, it's up in the air. Come _on,_ yes or no?"

"Yes," Casey says with resignation, rolling her eyes. "Get three, though. You're totally coming with."

Derek flaps his hand at her. "It's fine. They'll think it's weird."

She frowns. "I want you to come."

"Well - " Derek scowls a little, squinting at the screen again. Casey shakes her head at him, huffing - she's been trying to convince him to go to the eye doctor for _months._ He refuses, on the grounds that only old people need glasses, which is ridiculous and absurd, considering how hot he'd look in them. He remains unconvinced. "I can get a ticket later, or something. They're already on our case about getting separate apartments, it's just easier this way."

Casey opens her mouth, and then closes it again, unsure of what to say. It's hard, sometimes, to figure out how to talk around the thing, especially when the thing you're doing loops around is the _big _thing you've been dancing with since you were sixteen. Like a really bad, unavoidable habit, that is also a huge pain in the ass. "So it's their problem, not ours. It's not _weird_, Derek - you're just as close to him as I am. I mean, sheesh, you're the one he took to the Oilers game when he got those club-level tickets! And you guys like, drink together and smoke cigars or whatever it is that goes on at that weird, snobby country club he's a part of - "

"Casey," Derek says, long suffering and pained, "it's a bar, okay? It's just a bar. Just because they have leather couches and good bourbon doesn't make it a country club."

"Whatever," Casey says, frowning. "You're the one being weird about this."

"I am not! Why are you making this an issue? I'm trying to be _considerate _here."

"Well don't pull a muscle or anything," Casey replies, rolling her eyes. "I want you to come, okay? It won't be fun without you."

Derek sighs, rubbing his eyes briefly. Casey bites her lip and resists the urge to ask how he slept last night. "Case, I don't wanna fight right now. I really do have to work."

"Fine," Casey snaps, unsure why she's suddenly angry but unwilling to give in, as usual, "buy two then. Since you're so right about everything. God forbid I want to actually spend time with you - I don't know what I was thinking."

"Oh, _please_," Derek says on a groan, smacking his palm lightly against the surface of the desk in agitated frustration. "Whatever you're really pissed off about, could you just...for once, just work it out on your own? I'm not kidding. I'm don't have time to hold your fucking hand right now."

"Screw you," Casey says, pushing back from the desk, her heart pounding. "It's your own fault, you know - if you didn't procrastinate - "

"I _wasn't_ procrastinating, thank you very much, I had other _work_ to catch up on this week - and what do you know about my job, anyway? You barely even listen to me when I talk about it - "

"That's not true! And that's pretty rich coming from the guy who misses two out of three of my performances."

"I haven't missed any of them since - you know what, no." Derek shakes his head at her. "I'm buying these stupid tickets and we're ending this. Not tonight, Casey! I mean it."

"Fine," she says again, already choked up, to her own faint horror. She storms towards the door, resolving to just slam it shut and be done with it, but of course the monster that lives in her chest can't be satisfied until she gets the last word. "I'll buy the tickets, though. Don't do me any _favors._"

"Oh, very mature," Derek calls after her, sounding just as irrationally furious as she feels. Casey slams the door on him, then. It feels really good, which she decides to feel guilty about later.

* * *

Pacing back and forth in her bedroom that night, Casey makes a list of everything she's feeling, which is something her therapist told her to do whenever she feels like throwing something expensive out the window. It reads as follows:

1\. ANGRY  
2\. ANGRY  
3\. ANGRY

(It goes on like this for a bit longer.)

14\. GUILTY  
15\. SAD  
16\. HORNY ANGRY  
17\. LONELY,

\- which is where she finally stops. It's only going to get more pathetic from here.

She and Derek have been sharing this condo for almost a year now, and they've already officially renewed their lease, which they haven't told Nora and George about since they both know it's going to lead to some uncomfortable conversations. Part of what's stupid about it is that they're telling _the truth_ when they lay out their reasons for living together - it really is cheaper, it really does work pretty well - tonight was actually the exception, but of course nobody believes them when they say they don't really fight that much anymore - and most importantly, they _like it._ Casey knows none of them take it seriously, but it's comfortable, it's fulfilling, it's _nice_. She's used to his bad habits, and he's used to hers. They split money for groceries and watch terrible movies together at night. Neither of them have dated anyone seriously since college, anyway, and rent is so expensive in Kingston - why shouldn't they split it? At least this way, they can both be reasonably assured that the person they're living with isn't going to bring weird people over, or duck out on the bills, or any number of other horror stories that Casey's heard from friends about finding roommates in the city.

But it's also _not_ the truth, because, well. The other half of the truth is the thing they sort of half-talk about, acknowledge sort of but not really, but does that even count if they haven't even scraped together the guts to say it out loud _in private?_ Casey thinks no. That doesn't help when her mother sits her down to have A Talk, though. The last time, Casey had almost sweated through her shirt, nervously picking through an enchilada while Nora tried to be sensitive about telling her how her relationship with her stepbrother was totally weirding everyone out.

It's not like Derek hasn't noticed, or that they haven't talked about it, joked about it, whatever. But they haven't _talked_ talked - mostly they just - sort of talk, reference it quickly and then move on - which is another unspoken thing between them. Casey's very proud of herself, in terms of how much she's progressed in terms of emotional maturity, here - both in her ability to recognize where Derek's at with it, and to notice how careful he's being about her own not-readiness - but they can't resolve the thing with their family until they resolve the _actual_ thing, and Casey refuses to rush it. They'll do it when they'll do it, god damn it. If everyone would just _calm the hell down,_ maybe they could get there faster.

Her dad is very possibly the only one who's even close to being respectful about it, which Casey suspects is because he's had some heart-to-hearts with Derek that neither of them have told her about. They really do go out drinking together - which was weird at first, but Casey's an adult now, she can share her dad with other people just fine, thank you very much - and a few times, when Derek's come home from one of those nights, he'll be sort of shellshocked and vaguely traumatized - wandering blankly around the house like he's just had a near-death experience.

_i bought the tix,_ Derek texts, from downstairs. Casey flops down on her bed as she opens the message, wiping away guilty tears she'll never admit to, later. _we can talk tmrw. please quit pacing, you're giving the fish anxiety_

_Our fish had anxiety from the day we brought them home, let's get real,_ Casey sends back, biting her lip. _Sorry about earlier. If you want me to proofread your pitch you can email it to me._

_it's okay,_ he sends, and that's all she gets. Casey waits another ten minutes or so, and then she hears him turn some music on, which pushes her over the edge again, and then she has to bury her face in her pillow so it's not too embarrassing. She hates it when he sees her cry. Or like, knows when she's been crying. It's just the _worst_ feeling for both of them, really.

Is she having a crisis? Possibly. Is she about to get her period? Also very probable. But is she in the middle of a rock and a hard place between the delicate situation concerning the most important person in her life, and the rest of her family who are clearly becoming extremely uncomfortable around her?

Also yes. Something's telling her that the lists aren't gonna cut it this time.

* * *

They sort of make up the next morning - meaning he lets her have half of his Pop Tart before he leaves for work - but then he kind of ignores her for about four days, which are miserable and lonely and gross, in Casey's opinion. She mopes around at work and then comes home and eats TV dinners; it's very sad.

When he finally shows up at her studio with forgiveness macarons, Casey almost ruins the whole thing and lays one on him right there - but fortunately she's got twelve six-year-old ballerinas in her waiting room watching, which is the best mood killer in the world, thank God.

"I had no idea," Derek says, ducking quickly into her office and eyeing the lobby with a hunted expression, "that there were so many mini-yous running around in this city. I don't think I feel safe here anymore."

"Every single one of those little girls is a better dancer than me," Casey tells him. "Oh my God - did you get all pistachio? Just for me?"

"Don't get weepy," Derek warns her.

"I'm so sorry we fought, I hate when you're mad at me," Casey says quickly, immediately weepy, of course. "I mean for-real mad, anyway - it sucks. And I'm sorry again for yelling at you when you were just trying to help."

"I wasn't mad at you, was I? I was just - you know, cooling off," Derek says, looking shifty. "Eat a macaron and don't cry. And don't you dare hug me."

"Okay," Casey says tearfully, and shoves one in her mouth. It's really good.

"I hate that you have an office," Derek says, poking around at her desk and avoiding eye contact while she pulls her shit together. "What do you need an office for? Don't say paperwork."

"It's for paperwork," Casey says. "Do you have any idea how many forms are involved when you're purchasing recital outfits for eight different classes of five-to-nine year-olds?"

"Oh, right. And what is this, inspiration?" Derek lifts a creased romance novel from the desk and holds it in front of his face. The half-naked Highlander on the cover suddenly looks much more embarrassing than he'd seemed at the used bookstore the other day. "I don't know how this outfit is gonna go over with the moms, Case."

Casey snatches it out of his hand. "Everyone deserves a little indulgence every now and then, don't get weird about it."

Derek snorts. "Is that a weird euphemism for beating your - "

"Stop!"

"Prude," Derek says lazily, and collapses in her desk chair. "When are you done?"

"Four-ish, depending on how late the parents are to pick up the kids from my two forty-five barre class," Casey says cautiously. "Why?"

"I'm gonna take your car in. My buddy down at Herman's Auto has an opening this afternoon, and he said he can take a look at your brakes."

"I can imagine what he's gonna say," Casey says uncomfortably. "Derek, I can't really afford to get them done yet, not while I'm still paying off my Visa card - "

Derek waves his hand in the air abruptly, shaking his head. "Don't worry about it."

"You're _not_ paying for it."

"He's cutting me a break, and you can pay me back," he says flippantly. Casey frowns, biting into another macaron grumpily. "Casey, come on, it's what, a couple hundred bucks? And I'm not driving home with you on those shitty, loud-ass brakes."

"I was gonna try and talk you into taking _your_ car."

Derek scrunches up his face sadly. "The Prince," he says exaggeratedly, "is an old man, sweetheart. He's too fragile for road trips." He shudders. "Seriously though, it's a bad idea. The AC broke again."

"Fine." Casey eats another macaron, and thinks about the possibility of Derek making his own lists. He'd never write them down, of course, but he might have them in his head. His would probably be a lot longer than hers, and with a lot more curse words. He's a much more emotionally complex person than she is. "I'm paying for the hotel, then."

Derek sighs. "They're gonna be weird about that, too."

"Well, tough," Casey says, scrunching up her face. "Unless you really _wanted_ to sleep on the floor of the baby's room?"

"Of course I don't, I'm just warning you," Derek says, and steals one of her macarons.

* * *

It will be nice to be home for a few days, Casey will admit. Edwin's not going to make it, he has a really good internship that starts that same week, but Liz is coming, and Emily will be there, of course. She's been student teaching at the high school while she finishes up her degree, _finally_ \- not that Casey's judgmental. Out loud.

Nora and George had downgraded to a smaller house on the other side of town a few months ago, once Marti broke all their hearts and went to Argentina to live with her mother for high school. Their excuse is that they wanted to save up some money to buy a vacation home somewhere - maybe up by the lake by Grandma - but really Casey knows it's because they've both got a touch of the empty nest syndrome. With Jamie shaping up to be twice as rambunctious as Derek and Edwin ever were, Casey doesn't know why they think they're going to have any more time on their hands, though.

"Plus they have a balcony off their bedroom now," Marti says, FaceTiming them in the car, gifted with the magical sense of when exactly to call so that she catches them both at the same time. "Dad uses it to smoke, Nora pretends she doesn't notice. And on their date nights they sit out there and drink wine and listen to bad music. It's all very nice."

"You've never even seen it in person, Smarts," Derek says. Casey tilts the phone obligingly so Marti can see him frowning deeply at the windshield as he attempts to change lanes in peak rush hour traffic. "God damn it. What the fuck is this moron doing? There are _two lanes,_ asshole!"

Casey tilts the phone back. "He didn't sleep well last night," she tells Marti.

"Fuck off, Case."

"He should let you drive," Marti says. Behind her, Casey can see the windows in her bedroom, which open up to a beautiful mountain view that Casey is only sorta jealous of. Abby is homeschooling Marti through the rest of the summer to get her caught up so she can join the local secondary school in the fall - a remote, online class set up for the children in the remote village they're living in. Eight months away, and Marti's already a completely different person - mature, thoughtful, still very funny but in a more dry way than her brothers, compassionate, excited to wake up every day. It's hard for Derek, especially, to see the changes from so far away, cut off from the day to day experience of watching her grow up, but Casey can tell he's also so proud of her he almost can't stand it.

"That'll only stress him out more, he thinks I'm bad at it."

"You _are_ bad at it," Derek chimes in. "Marti, has she told you about the latest fender bender?"

"That was _four months_ ago, and it wasn't even that bad!"

Marti's laughing. "Again, Case?"

"I was parallel parking and I dinged the car in front of me. Whatever," Casey says, huffing. "Derek's eaten it so many times on his bicycle it's a miracle he hasn't killed himself, and nobody walks around talking about what a public health hazard _he_ is."

"The amount of damage I can do with a fucking bike is a little bit different than the potential damage you can wreak with this eighteen hundred kilogram car - "

"Whatever," Casey says again, angling the phone away from Derek even more. Marti's still laughing at them, shaking her hair out of its bun with one hand, her knees pulled up to her chest in her desk chair. "He says that like he hasn't killed who knows how many small animals with The Prince - a massacre that's gone unreported, I might add, an injustice that's been allowed to run rampant over our city streets - "

"Two squirrels! Three years apart! Fuck you!"

"I miss you guys," Marti says, grinning ear to ear. "You should come down for Christmas. Mom will buy you tickets if you want."

"Oh, Marti, we'd love to," Casey says. "We'd have to see if we can both get away from work, though."

"Come on, the kiddos can survive without you for a couple weeks! It's beautiful here," Marti implores. "We're renting this house from someone Mom knew in grad school, and it's _huge,_ and it was built in like the 1800s so it's like, really really cool, you'd love it so much. And the people here are so nice - a lot of them speak enough English that you could get by on your own - and God, the sunrises, Case, you wouldn't believe it. They're so amazing."

"You know we'll try to make it work, Smarti," Derek chimes in. Casey swivels the phone again, and Derek makes a face at the screen. Marti scrunches up her own expression playfully in response. "Don't let Mom buy us tickets until we're sure on the dates, though. You know how she is."

Abby has a bit of a bad habit of assuming that everyone has the ability to pack up their shit and leave the country at a moment's notice, which is kind of charming at the same time that it's deeply annoying. Last summer she'd bought Casey and Derek tickets for an Alaskan cruise for a joint birthday present, which was a sort of dream come true vacation for Casey - the Northern Lights! Holy shit! - until they'd noticed that the dates were literally a week and a half away. Abby and Marti had gone instead. "Yeah, she's getting better about that. She asked before she bought me the moped."

"Baby steps," Casey says encouragingly. Marti nods enthusiastically.

"She's so fucking grown up," Derek says, after they've rambled Marti out, who'd signed off to go ride her moped around town, or hike up the side of a mountain, or whatever it is that she does in her free time down there in paradise. "Every time I see her face, she looks like a year older."

"She's fourteen, Derek, they start growing twice as fast at that age," Casey says, reaching out to squeeze his wrist. Derek turns his palm over and grabs her hand, tugging it over the gear shift to rest against his leg as he drives. "She's still your Smarti."

"I know."

"It's good for her to be down there - you know Abby didn't get hardly any time with her when she was a kid, and God, the experiences she's having - it's an incredible opportunity - "

"I know!"

"And it doesn't mean it's not hard to be away from her, but keeping her home and smothered isn't gonna do her any favors either, regardless of what your dad thinks - "

"Yes, sweetheart, I _know_," Derek says, squeezing her hand. "Thank you. Please shut up."

"Okay," Casey says with a sigh, squeezing back. "Do you think we'll stay as close to Jamie as we are to Marti? As he grows up?"

"I don't know. We still call him 'the baby,' you know, but he's not a baby anymore." Derek squints at the highway - having finally made it out of the thick of Kingston's city streets - and frowns deeply. "I think I freak him out. I'm too tall, or too loud, or something."

Casey shakes her head wordlessly. She wonders, sometimes, if their own discomfort is the reason why it's difficult to spend time with Jamie - who of course is completely innocent and doesn't deserve to suffer for their weird issues - but other times, she thinks it's more just an aspect of the situation. He's ten years old, but by virtue of the distance between them, Casey and Derek honestly haven't spent much time with him. When they were in college, it was easier to come home - for a lot of reasons - but now, with work and everything, the time just slips away from them so quickly. A three hour drive doesn't seem like much, but it also kind of is. "It's not just you. He barely even talks to me." Casey readjusts her grip on Derek's hand, and Derek presses her palm flat against the side of his thigh, entwining their fingers, making her shiver. "He's used to being the center of attention. I think it freaks him out when we're all home, and there's suddenly five other people he has to compete with."

"Maybe it's," Derek says, pausing slightly with a slight grimace, "easier, or better, that he thinks of us as...in-laws, or something. Not siblings."

Casey swallows a lump in her throat. "I mean - that's - "

"Liz and Edwin are a different story, but we're all old enough now that you'd think - well," he interrupts, stuttering again. "Dad and Nora want it to still be like it was in high school. But even in high school, it wasn't...what they thought it was, at least with us, and - fuck, I don't know what I'm trying to say. Forget I said anything."

"No," Casey says, trying to meet his eyes, but they stay locked on the road. The one time he decides to observe safe driving practices is of course when they're talking about _feelings._ "No, I mean - if you're ready to talk about it, then we should talk about it. I just kind of thought we were still - you know - but I can be ready if you are!"

"I don't know if we're ready. What does 'ready' even mean? Who the fuck is ever ready, Case?"

A good point. Casey leans her head against the edge of her seat, blinking sadly at the radio, still on the satellite radio preview station that neither of them have bothered to change since they always hook up one of their phones, anyway. Casey keeps two chargers in her car - one for her iPhone, another for Derek's Android - it's the same in the Prince. His mother treats them as if they're already married - joint presents, grown up vacations, phone calls in which she pokes around the subject of children, trying to take their temperature on it without being pushy, which always makes Derek twitchy and weird for the rest of the day. Their friends in Kingston just assume and neither of them bother to correct it anymore. What's the difference? What is, honestly, the thing that holds them back, when in a practical sense they're already there?

Nora and George and Jamie, are the thing, but sometimes Casey forgets why they're so afraid of it. Would they get disowned? No. Would it be extremely awkward for awhile? Yes, but whatever, right? Casey knows in her heart that her mother loves her, that George is an excellent father, that Edwin and Liz might feel creeped out about it but they'd get over themselves quickly for their sake - so what's the issue? A few people from high school who'd gossip about them at the reunion? A couple months of strained Skype calls, a really weird Christmas dinner?

Sometimes they're too neurotic for their own good. And Casey's including Derek in that estimation.

"Let's stop at Emily's," Casey says impulsively, breaking the solemn silence. "I told her I'd stop by. She's got a three day weekend, she told me to come over anytime."

Derek grimaces. "I can drop you off."

"She'd love to see you too!"

"No, she tells you she'd love to see me because we promised you it wouldn't affect your friendship when we started dating, but in reality she'd like nothing more for me to get snapped right out of existence, Thanos-style."

"That's not true," Casey says weakly, because it kind of is. It really hadn't ended well, the second time.

"I'll drop you off, and check in at the hotel, and meet you at Nora and George's," Derek says decisively, squeezing her hand again to stop her from interrupting. "You're welcome in advance."

"You'll have to come get me later. Mom will want me to be there tonight; she needs help with the food. We won't have time tomorrow before Dad's flight gets in."

"Fine," Derek says easily.

"And text me when you get to the house. If Mom's too stressed I'll leave early."

"...anything else?" Derek asks, at length, annoyed again.

"No," Casey replies prissily, tugging at his hand. "Don't miss our exit. You need to get over into the left lane. Remember how you missed it last time?"

"Jesus Christ, Case," Derek says, rolling his eyes. He doesn't let go of her hand, though.

* * *

Emily has a very cool apartment on the hip side of London, which is sort of like a suburban equivalent of a downtown area. She's subleasing it from the friend of a friend of hers from college, which is the most specific description Casey can get out of her - secretly, she suspects it's a touchy ex-boyfriend situation that she doesn't want to talk about. They're close, but they've also lived three hours apart for like ten years. It's not like Casey's bending her ear about _her_ romantic life.

"Just a little, come on," Emily says, laughing as she pops open a bottle of wine. "I haven't seen you in months. And you're on vacation!"

"Family vacation," Casey says. "But yes, I take your point."

"If I had champagne, I'd make mimosas, which is a more daytime appropriate drink. To protect your very grown up sensibilities," Emily teases, pouring the bubbly wine into the mason jars she uses as glasses - she's _such_ a hipster now, Casey thinks it's hilarious. "Or I could add fruit, maybe that would help. Like sangria, you know, you just throw a bunch of strawberries and peaches in, and bam, it's a wedding reception drink. A 'brunch with your coworkers' drink."

"Doesn't sangria use red wine?"

"You can make it with white," Emily says, with authority. "Here, try it. It's Moscato, it's sweet."

"I like Moscato! You act like I'm still fifteen and don't know the difference between whiskey and wine coolers," Casey says, She takes a performative drink, smacking her lips out loud for Emily's benefit, who's still looking skeptical. "I've been roommates with Derek for how long? Of course I know how to drink alcohol."

"Okay, but do you remember that time in Vancouver that you literally couldn't think of what to order at that sports bar? You were so embarrassed because you wanted to look cool in front of your dance teacher - "

"I was _nineteen,_" Casey says, blushing at the memory.

"Aw, Case, I'm only teasing, I love you," Emily says, laughing loudly, curls bouncing. She looks amazing - grown up and more comfortable with herself, her hair unstraightened for the first time since high school, her natural curls are strikingly beautiful. She's got them pulled back on top of her head, wrapped in a blue scarf headband, which combined with her hippie-looking wrap dress, makes her look like a cool art teacher or something, which is fairly ironic considering she's going to be teaching physics. "Talk to me about your life. Texting every now and then isn't enough, I wanna hear everything."

Casey sort of doubts that, to be honest. Emily had barely even acknowledged Derek when he'd dropped her off, which had been sort of funny. "Work, home, work, home. You know. I'm sure you're the same, now that you're student teaching."

Emily rolls her eyes. "You're still not dating?"

"Nah," Casey says, taking another sip of wine. "Too busy."

"Oh, please!"

"It's true! I'm boring," Casey says. "What about you? That guy you told me about, the talent booker at the nightclub in Chinatown?"

"Commitment phobe. Not worth my time," Emily says, waving her hand. "I refuse to believe you haven't gotten laid since you broke up with Matthew - that's three years, Case. _Three years._ Tell me you're at least going out."

It's been longer than three years, in point of fact, because she and Matthew only had sex a few times, and even that had felt sort of perfunctory since their relationship was sort of awkward and empty start to finish. She'd embellished the details for Emily, who always seemed disappointed when Casey's dating stories were boring. "I go out, yes."

"To clubs? With people? Young people?" Emily leans in and pokes Casey's cheek. "You dance and drink with adult men? Men who know how to handle you?"

"I dance! I drink!" Casey bats her hand away. "Stop worrying about me. I'm taking full advantage of my vibrant youth, thank you very much."

"Hm. Somehow I don't believe you." Emily slides onto the kitchen barstool next to Casey, leaning her knee against the seat of Casey's. Their elbows knock together companionably, reminding Casey of when they were kids, snuggled up together in the cafeteria, avoiding the bitchy volleyball players that used to sneer at them in the hallways. "We should go out while you're here. You and me. How long are you staying, again?"

"We're leaving early Tuesday," Casey says. "We both could get Monday off, but Derek's got a meeting on Tuesday he can't miss."

Emily smiles. "Perfect. Sunday night, then. The bars won't be packed, Uber won't be too pricey. I love going out on Sundays. And you've got all of Monday to recover from the hangover."

Casey sips her wine instead of saying anything, discomfited by the idea but not wanting to say no right away. Derek doesn't mind when she goes out to bars - he probably wouldn't even say anything if she went home with someone - but he doesn't do that himself, hasn't done that for a long time now, and Casey doesn't want to hurt him, or make him think that she's trying to push him away. She can't say that to Emily, of course. And going out with her would mean prowling for guys - that's pretty much the main priority of bar crawling, for Emily, which Derek knows very well.

"It'll be fun. You have to let me dress you up." Emily reaches out and refills Casey's glass, shooing away Casey's protest with a scoff. "I already know you didn't bring anything slutty enough. No arguments! I haven't seen you since Christmas!"

"Fine, but we're not getting drunk _now,_" Casey says. "I have to go cook appetizers with my mother later."

"Uh huh, sure," Emily says, topping off her own mason jar with a flourish. "We'll switch to coffee in a second, right after I age twenty years and switch out my entire personality."

"I'm just saying, I will be working around open flame! Pan frying things, baking things!"

"There's a reason I came into your life, Casey, and it's not because you were having enough fun without me," Emily says sagely. "Drink your fucking wine."

"Those are some famous last words, if I've ever heard them," Casey says. "Derek's gonna kill me."

Emily takes a pointed drink out of her own glass, and doesn't acknowledge the name. Casey follows suit, and tries to remember if she'd packed Ibuprofen in her purse.

* * *

"Drunk? You're drunk," Derek says, looking up from his phone as Casey fumbles her way into the passenger seat. Very unchivalrous of Emily to kick her out onto the street like a vagabond, refusing to walk her to the car in favor of collapsing onto her bed for a nap and yelling at Casey to lock the door behind her. "Jesus Christ, Case, it's four o'clock. The sun is still out. Watch your fucking head!"

Casey pauses, half-in and half-out of the car, and ducks her head carefully to avoid the top of the car, which suddenly seems both very far away and very close, all the same time. "Emily made me do it. She had secret bottles of wine. Like, everywhere, in her kitchen. She just kept pulling them out." With difficulty, she manages to make it into the seat, and then moves onto the next task of getting all limbs and articles of clothing out of the range of the door. "Oh my God, why am I even wearing a sweater? This is ridiculous."

Derek huffs, reaching over her to help, grabbing her purse and slapping her hands away from the door. "_You're_ ridiculous. Do you know what I've been doing all day?"

Casey lifts up her hands in the air, giggling a little at the look on his face as he pulls the door shut. "No."

"I went to the hardware store with my dad, Casey." Derek shoves the purse in the backseat, pulling back to his side with a disgruntled glare. "I helped him pick out a leafblower."

For many reasons, this is very funny. "Well, did you find one?"

"No! We walked around for two hours and then he decided to do more research online." Derek glares at her. "You smell like a bachelorette party. I can't take you to your mother's house like this."

"Then take me somewhere else," Casey says impulsively, her head swimming pleasantly. "Take me to the hotel. I'll take a shower or something."

"Nora's already cooking dinner - she thinks we're coming straight back." Derek rubs the bridge of his nose, sighing. Distantly, Casey feels sort of guilty - in the drunken sort of way, how she knows she'll be feeling it much more at a later, more sober date - and reaches out to clumsily pat his shoulder. Derek looks witheringly at her hand, his face deeply skeptical. "You are so high maintenance it's actually incredible. They should do studies on you."

"That's mean," Casey says, pouting a little. Like, he's right, but he doesn't have to _say_ it. "Don't be mean to me. I'm drunk."

"You deserve it," Derek says, shifting the car into gear and pulling out into the street. "We'll stop at Starbucks."

"Ooh," Casey says. "Caramel ribbon crunch frappucino." She stretches out the vowels in the word just for fun, and then giggles at herself.

Derek looks unimpressed. "Black coffee," he says, "and water. Lots of water. I know Emily wasn't making you drink water."

"That is true, I do not remember any water," Casey says thoughtfully. Struggling with her seatbelt, Casey finally gives up, shoving it under her thigh and letting her arms flop to her sides with a sigh. "Derek. Can I ask you a question?"

"No," Derek says.

Casey ignores this. "Are you man enough to handle me?"

Derek sighs deeply, and reaches up to pinch the bridge of his nose again.

"Emily thinks I should be dating the kinds of guys I dated in high school, I guess because that's the last time she was around enough to witness my car crash dating life." Casey pauses to giggle. "Car crash life. That's exactly what we should call it."

"Your life is not a car crash," Derek says, his voice oddly gentle. Casey blinks at him, her vision blurring because of the bright, late afternoon sunlight that's streaming in through the driver's side window.

"I get in a lot of car crashes," Casey says sadly. "Thank God we only live five minutes away from my studio. I couldn't handle the interstate every morning - can you even imagine?"

Derek reaches out and grabs her hand, frowning out at the windshield. He's wearing sunglasses, and Casey really wishes, in this moment, that he wasn't, so she could see his eyes. "I would drive you. If you got another job, or we had to move. We'd work something out."

"I know," Casey says, leaning her cheek against the headrest. She feels a wave of emotion for him, a mixed up burst of affection/lust/exasperation/fear that's as familiar to her as her own name. He's wearing this shirt she hates and he's not looking at her, and she loves him. Her head might explode from it one day. Maybe that's how she'll die - an explodey love brain. "I tried to tell her that, but she wasn't listening. She really hates you now."

"I deserve it," Derek says ruefully, tugging her hand up and pressing it this time, against his chest. "There's a bottle of water in the back pocket of my seat. Can you reach it?"

Casey strains her neck to look. "Um. Probably not."

"Fine - it's fine, no, don't try and reach - I'll get it for you at the next stoplight." Derek laughs suddenly, his teeth a shocking hint of white behind his scraggly, two-day-old vacation beard. "You owe me big time for this. Just saying."

"I know," Casey says wistfully, and then jumps, yanking back her hand and yelping loudly when the seat belt works its way free and almost smacks her in the face.

"Jesus Christ," Derek says again.

* * *

Derek buys her a venti black coffee and doesn't let her put cream in it, although he does capitulate to some stevias. Then he patiently waits outside the bathroom while she splashes water on her face and pees like four times, and he doesn't even make fun of her when she finally stumbles out, damp around the edges and still miserably drunk.

"I'm a terrible person," Casey moans, letting him push her back out to the car. "I promised Mom I'd help her make olive penguins!"

"What the fuck is an olive penguin?" Derek asks, catching her purse as it starts to fall off her shoulder.

"It's where you cut open an olive and put cream cheese inside, and then you put little bits of carrot at the bottom and it looks like a penguin," Casey says. "Duh."

"Oh, right, those. Of course," Derek replies, rolling his eyes.

"I can't use knives in this state," Casey tells him mournfully. "Mom's very bad at the construction. It takes a delicate hand!" She's practically wailing by the end of the sentence, leaning heavily against the car. "And oh God, I'm gonna be hungover when my dad gets here tomorrow - what was I thinking - "

"And we're onto the mopey stage, I see," Derek says, pushing her into the car. "Get in before they call the cops on us, Case, the barista was giving me the weird eyes. She probably thought I was trafficking you or something."

"Hah! Cuz you're creepy looking, in that shirt," Casey says, straight into his face. Derek pinches her side and makes her giggle. "Stop! I'm gonna puke if you make me laugh too hard."

He grimaces. "Just get in, party girl. Jesus, you're gonna give me an ulcer." Despite his complaining, he's still gentle as he helps her into the seat, gathering her sweater onto her lap so it doesn't get caught in the door as he closes it. Casey leans her forehead against the window and watches him jog around the car to the driver's side, smiling dreamily at him as he slides in, shaking the entire car with his weight. "What? What's with the eyes?"

"You need a haircut," Casey says, smiling at him goofily. "You look like a homeless person."

"Okay," Derek says, after an incredulous beat of silence. "Sure. You wanna do it right now? I have a pocket knife on my keychain that should work."

"Or maybe just a shave," Casey continues thoughtfully, reaching out to scratch at his ugly beard. "You should just grow this out and like, maintain it, Derek. You look good with facial hair, but when it's in this gross in-between stage it looks weird and patchy and weird."

"You said 'weird' twice, which I hope you know cancels it out entirely," Derek says, letting her grope his face for another long moment before gently pushing her hand back to her lap. "This is very funny coming from the woman who threatened to shave my mustache in my sleep."

"A mustache is a very different thing from a beard, you looked like a French porn star," Casey says incredulously.

"Says you!"

"Said everybody," Casey grumbles. "The parents at the studio complained about you. They thought you were sketchy."

"No they didn't," Derek says, rolling his eyes.

"They did!"

"Name one specific person. By name."

"Rachel Green," Casey says automatically, then winces, because that's from Friends. Derek cackles at her. "No, I meant...Rachel, um, Buffay. Wait, shit - "

"Drink the rest of your coffee," Derek says, still laughing as he shifts the car into reverse. "And all of that water."

Casey looks down at the two cups in the cupholder sadly. Both of them look like three more pee breaks, at least. "I really think this black coffee thing might be a myth, Derek."

"Better than nothing," Derek says, mercilessly.

* * *

Casey loses a little time on the drive, nodding forward into a sort of tipsy, dreamlike state as they drive. The sun is baking her half to death as it sets which makes it worse, and Derek has to physically pull her upright a few times, bitching the whole time about it in a way that is, somehow, still very sweet.

"How do you feel?" Derek asks, checking in as he pulls into a parking spot a few blocks down from the house, buying her a little more time. "Double vision? Nausea? Overpowering urges to text all your ex-boyfriends?"

"None of the above," Casey says, rubbing her eyes. "I think I'm still just sorta drunk."

"Well." Derek sighs. "It seems a miracle was beyond our reach today, sweetheart. Do you want to face the music, or should we skip out? Either way, we're gonna get yelled at, probably."

"We're already here," Casey says, squinting out at the neighborhood. She's only been to the new house once since they moved in; it only looks vaguely familiar. "I could just tell them I'm not feeling well, or something."

"Then she'll make you go lay down, and you'll end up spending the night there," Derek says wisely. "If that's what you wanna go with we should just go back to the hotel."

"Mom knows I was with Emily though! If we do that then she'll know I got drunk."

"I mean," Derek says, reaching out to smooth her hair away from her face affectionately, "you're twenty-eight years old, Case. You can get drunk if you wanna get drunk." He frowns slightly, letting his hand fall. "We're acting like teenagers right now, aren't we?"

"We always do, when we come here," Casey says softly. The haze of alcohol has thinned out into a wavering sort of barrier between her brain and the real world, making her feel like she's sleepwalking or something. "Still an asshole move. I did promise to help her cook."

"But," Derek tuts, tugging at her hand, "not the end of the world. What is she gonna do, ground you? Come on - let's leave the car here and walk. Moving around a little will help."

"Okay. Sure." Derek grins, and practically hops out of the car. Casey swallows back the emotion in her throat, oddly choked up, watching him dart around the nose to open her door for her. "You know," she says, leaning heavily on her arm as she gets out, "I think you are man enough to handle me, Derek. I just decided."

"Thank God, I was on the edge of my seat waiting for your decision," Derek says, not even blinking. "Bring the rest of your water, Case."

"You carry it."

"It's your water! I told you to finish it."

"They have water inside," Casey says stubbornly, slamming the door shut. Derek immediately rolls his eyes and opens it again, grabbing her purse that she'd left on the floor in front of her seat. "Oh. Thanks."

"You're welcome," Derek says pointedly, biting back a grin as he angles the strap over her shoulder. "Emily seems to have imparted quite a few opinions on your life, Case. You were only there for like four hours."

"She's got lots of opinions, that's right," Casey says, following him up onto the median, reaching out for his arm as she stumbles in the grass. He guides her up onto the sidewalk, one hand on her waist, and she relaxes into the touch, comforting as it always is. "She thinks I should go out more. Date, you know."

"Date _other_ people," Derek clarifies.

"Right."

"Hm." If this bothers him, he doesn't show it. "I feel like now is the time to mention that you had twice the amount of experience she does by like, grade eleven, and you weren't even _trying_ that hard."

"That's true, I was simply a hormonally-confused bystander," Casey says mournfully, and Derek snorts a laugh into her hair. "Addled by my own emotions, pulled to and fro by bicep-y football players and Ezra Miller lookalike bad boys - "

"'Bicep-y'?" Derek repeats, incredulous.

"You know what I mean."

"Wish I didn't," Derek says, wrapping his arm around her waist more definitively, letting her lean against him as they walk. "She means well, Case, but you shouldn't let it get to you."

"I know," Casey says glumly. "I just wish...well, I wish you hadn't dumped her so brutally the second time, but - "

"Hey, it takes two to tango! She would've dumped me too, if I hadn't beaten her to it. She even admitted it once!"

"_But,_" Casey says pointedly, "I wish I was braver. I guess. I wish I could...say things and not be afraid of them."

Derek pulls her to a stop, right in the middle of the sidewalk. "Say them to me."

"Derek, you know what I mean, it's just - "

"I know what you mean, and I want you to say it out loud to me," Derek insists. He touches her face, with his free hand, running his knuckles down the line of her jaw, smiling at her full-body shiver. "Just say it. We've been fucking around for long enough. We're twenty-eight, Case, what are we afraid of?"

Casey takes one deep breath, and then two. She doesn't feel all that drunk anymore, but her head is spinning, just a little bit. "I love you. I'm in love with you."

Derek makes a small noise, like the sound you make when you run into the side of a table, or you turn the corner and almost run into someone out of nowhere. A surprised noise, halfway between surprised laughter and pain. "Wow."

"Yeah," Casey says shakily, laughing a little. "Am I awake? I'm awake, right?"

"Yes, we're awake." Derek lifts both hands to her face, now, holding her head in his palms, leaning in close and kissing her forehead for a long, long moment. Casey squeezes her eyes shut and tries not to burst into tears, because that would be really embarrassing, and also he'd make fun of her for it for the rest of their lives. "I love you too."

Casey bursts into giggles, instead. That's somewhat better. "Oh fuck," she says, leaning in hard to his chest, "we're the weirdest people ever. Fuck."

"I can't believe you just said 'fuck' twice," Derek says, faintly incredulous, which only makes her laugh harder. "Alright. Serious moment over, I guess. A guy tries to be romantic and sincere and this is what he gets, Jesus Christ - "

"No, no, wait," Casey says desperately, grabbing his arms before he can pull away. "Kiss me at least, you idiot. We haven't kissed since that time at the ballet, and that didn't count because we were drunk - "

"You're drunk now!"

"I'm sobering up!" Casey protests. "Mostly."

Derek frowns at her. "We kissed a few weeks ago. On the couch, remember?"

Casey flushes deep red. "I thought that was - you were half asleep - "

"You thought I was having a _sex dream?_" Derek asks incredulously, and then crows with laughter, bending over with the effort. "And you went _along with it?_ Oh my _God,_ Casey - "

"Shut up," Casey says, yanking him back upright by one arm. Knocking his arms away, she gets both hands on his face this time, and holds him still long enough for a kiss, which is less romantic and more ridiculous at first considering he's still laughing at her. Still, he gets the hint after a moment or two, yanking her closer by her waist and biting her bottom lip until she opens her mouth, at which point she loses track of time again. This time, in a much more pleasant way.

Derek's sort of an aggressive kisser, which Casey didn't like at first but has gotten used to, the more she turns it over in her head, realigning her fantasies of what she thought he'd be like with the reality of who he is. Their actual first kiss was in college, at an unfortunate frat party that neither of them had been invited to, and from there it sort of spiraled: in-between boyfriends and girlfriends, always with an excuse - _we were sleepwalking, we were drunk, I was having a panic attack, Mars was in retrograde._ Enough that it feels familiar now, even though this is the kiss Casey will forever refer to as their _real first,_ she still already knows what his hands will feel like, a split second before they slide into her hair, she still greets the full-body shudder like it's an old friend, come to call once again. It's not like she hasn't lain awake in bed, night after night, imagining how easy it would be to walk down the hallway and slip into his room. Not like she doesn't know how often he thinks about it too, his eyes heavy and serious in the mornings, running over her bare shoulders as she eats cereal in her nightgown. In retrospect it's sort of amazing they'd held out for this long.

They stand there for awhile, Derek's forearms resting on both of her shoulders, his hands clasped behind her head, humming and swaying a little inside of their big moment. Casey presses her forehead against his chin and laughs to herself, remembering a daydream she'd had frequently in high school, of sliding her hands beneath his shirt and touching his stomach - not a particularly racy one, especially compared to the fantasies she started to have once she discovered the concept of softcore porn and gave herself an education - but there was something about his abdomen that always got her going, a little - the strip of skin that showed beneath his shirt whenever he raised his arms above his head, the trail of hair that led downwards from his bellybutton, the heat she could feel from his chest when they'd sit scrunched up together in the backseat, on family road trips. Casey reaches down and pulls up his shirt, just enough to touch, and grins at the way he yelps with laughter, his stomach muscles twitching beneath her hand.

"Don't tickle me! You're still drunk," Derek says, moving his arms so that they're wrapped fully around her neck, in a hug that's closer to headlock.

"I'm not!" Casey keeps her hands beneath his shirt, sliding her arms around his waist and spreading her palms out on the small of his back. "I'm not. I'm happy."

"Okay," Derek says indulgently, kissing the crown of her head. "You're welcome."

Casey laughs out loud, trying to pull away so she can hit him, but he keeps her close, laughing and gripping her shoulders tightly. Casey gives up after a second and instead decides to keep enjoying his back. It's a nice back, she thinks. She's gone far too long not appreciating it.

"In retrospect," Derek finally says, gathering her hair in his hands and tucking it beneath the collar of her sweater to protect it from the wind, "it feels just cliche enough that we did this down the block from our parents' house. Considering we've been living together two hundred and sixty kilometers away from anyone who would get weirded out by it, with plenty of privacy and opportunity, it just feels, you know, _fitting_ that we waited until we were late for family dinner to have our first makeout."

"Please don't call it a 'makeout,'" Casey says.

"Oh, sorry. The first time I ate your face for real?"

"Derek, we just said 'I love you' for the first time," Casey scolds. "Just because I admitted it doesn't mean I'm gonna let you off the hook for being gross now, I hope you know."

"That was an emotional metaphor," Derek says. "I ate your face emotionally. Because I love you."

Casey rolls her eyes and then kisses him again, because she wants to, and fine, maybe also because she does think he's funny. Just a little. "You know what else Emily said I should do?"

"Break my heart and move to Europe?" Derek guesses.

"Dance more," Casey says, pulling back and sliding her hands down his arms until they're holding hands. "With men who know how to handle me."

Derek doesn't say anything, watching her with those serious, heavy eyes again, letting her swing his hands a little in the air between them. Casey smiles a little bashfully, feeling a blush heating up her cheeks and not really caring, and does a little two step as he watches, her heart racing as fast as the clouds are moving above them.

"How many blocks to the house?"

Derek tilts his head thoughtfully, the hint of a smile forming on his face. "About three or so, maybe."

"Far enough for a waltz," Casey says, tugging his arm up around her waist, arranging them into a semblance of a one-hand hold position. "What do you say?"

"The last time you made me waltz with you, I stepped on your feet and you swore you'd never let me torment you with my bad rhythm again," Derek says, but pulls her around in a half twirl nevertheless, grinning when she laughs in surprise. "But I'm a very good dancer, Case. You've always underestimated me."

"You dance a mean swing, it's just the slower ones that you have trouble with," Casey agrees. "Have you ever salsa'd?"

"Yes, but only in privacy, and never on Sundays," Derek jokes, moving cautiously into a shaky box step, frowning over her shoulder like he's trying to remember the movements. "My mother always told me I could go blind if I salsa'd too much."

"I'm gonna teach you how to salsa," Casey says, not even caring that she's setting herself up for a long series of dirty jokes, "and tango. And oh, Derek, you'd be so good at the foxtrot - "

"Sounds like the seven dwarves," Derek comments, gaining confidence as they start to move together more easily, waltzing back and forth on the empty sidewalk. They probably look _extremely_ strange to anyone who might be watching from their living room windows, Casey thinks ruefully. "Salsa, Cha Cha, Swing, and Foxtrot. And not to forget the sweet but stupid one with the hat - poor little Rumba."

"No, the sweet and stupid one would be called Swing," Casey says. "Rumba and Salsa are the leaders. Waltz is the sleepy one, Cha Cha's the sneezy one, and - I forget what the other dwarves are - "

"Watch out, I'm gonna dip you," Derek interrupts, and before she can react, pulls her into a deep bend, her hair almost brushing the ground. Casey shrieks, and then laughs, lightheaded and happy, her heart fizzing up into her throat, like her whole body's suddenly running on static electricity. "Hoo boy. That was a close one, I almost dropped you!"

"Fucking idiot," Casey says fondly, and pulls his neck down for another kiss. She can't _wait_ to write her next list. It's gonna be a good one.

* * *

The three blocks between the car and the house are probably the longest three blocks anyone has ever waltzed, although Casey doesn't regret a second. Her phone buzzes a couple times, but she decides not to check it. Who cares? Not Casey! Living in the moment, that's right! At least until she sobers up the rest of the way, but that's tomorrow's problem, quite frankly.

"Are you sure you don't wanna go back to the hotel," Derek mumbles, artfully dodging her hands to press one more kiss against her neck, pulling away after she makes a solid hit to his solar plexus. "Jesus. Never mind, I'm not horny anymore - "

"Gross, Derek, don't say that," Casey says, wrinkling her nose. "'In the mood' works just as well."

"What am I, a middle-aged Boomer in a Viagra commercial? I'm not saying 'in the mood,'" Derek says derisively.

"It's _tactful._"

"Shut up. Seriously, you're killing me," Derek says, and yanks her back over to his side again, wrapping his arm around her shoulders. "How drunk are you still?"

"Like...twenty percent. Twenty-five, maybe."

"Okay. And what's the plan?" Derek checks his watch. "We're an hour late for dinner. Nora's been all-caps-texting me since Starbucks. What are we doing?"

"I'll take care of it," Casey says, with a confidence that she'd been missing twenty minutes ago. Maybe the static electricity is helping, she thinks. "We'll eat and chat for awhile, I'll tell her Emily and I overindulged, she'll scold and sigh at me, George will make some jokes, then when they go upstairs to put Jamie to bed, we'll bounce. I'll wake up early and come over to help her cook in the morning, while you and George are picking Dad up at the airport."

Derek leans down and presses the side of his face against her cheek. "I meant," he says softly, squeezing her shoulder with his hand, "what's the _plan,_ Case?"

Casey's stomach wobbles a little. "What do you think the plan should be?"

"I think...whatever you think, because this stresses you out more than it stresses me and I'm not stupid," Derek says carefully. He pulls away, more serious than before. "It's up to you. I'll follow your lead."

Casey thinks about it for a long moment, as they carefully navigate their way down the last stretch of sidewalk, much more precarious now in the dark than it had been earlier, waltzing in the sunset. If they tell them tonight...her mother's already angry, probably, that Derek told her he'd be right back and then promptly disappeared for two hours and ignored her texts. Especially if she was cooking - she'd probably gone to a lot of trouble, anxious to see Casey, and now she feels ignored and slighted. If Casey shows up - drunk, late, her mouth bruised with kisses - of course Nora's not going to take it well, when she drops the bomb. There will be yelling, maybe some crying. Jamie will be mildly traumatized, since he's grown up so far in a much quieter household than the rest of them had. George won't know how to react - he'll probably try to pull Derek aside, to _reason_ with him, like it's an impulsive, stupid thing they're doing and all they need is to calm down a little. No, not a good idea to do it tonight. Better to catch them when everyone's in a better mood - when Nora isn't primed for a fight anyway, when George has a better idea of the situation. They should just...get through it, and then go back to the hotel and go to town on each other like stupid, guilty teenagers, and in the morning they'll go back and throw her dad a party and grin and bear the awkward parts and when they're ready for it, they'll break the news. That's the mature thing.

On the other hand, Derek's not really looking at her, and his hand is pretty tight on her shoulder. Casey looks up at him in the dying light and thinks about how much effort he puts into covering their bases with their family, how he didn't buy himself a ticket because it might make them uncomfortable, how really he was doing that for Casey's sake, which is why it made her so mad in the first place. That party, years ago, in college - he'd wanted to go all the way then, had even almost said it out loud, but backed off when she lost her nerve. He'd followed her down the sidewalk, babbling frantically at her as she freaked out - _just breathe, Case, it's not that big of a deal - we don't even have to tell anyone! - I didn't mean to, I was drunk, for fuck's sake, calm down - _all those excuses, all this time they could've been moving forward and they weren't, because Casey was too afraid, and because he could always tell when he pushed too far. Those three days they didn't talk - when he was _cooling off_ \- how he'd barely look at her, because she'd actually hurt his feelings, but he didn't want her to feel guilty, and he _still_ let her have his Pop Tarts. Even tonight, how he'd asked her to say it, with his hands gentle on her shoulders, and even then she'd been practically begging him to give her the opening. Always her lead, because he always knew that he moved faster than she did.

"Derek," Casey says, pulling him to a stop at the mouth of their parents' sidewalk. Inside, the windows are lit up and bright, the porch light on, both cars in the driveway. "What do _you_ want?"

"I want to take you back to the hotel and do unspeakable things to you," Derek says automatically.

"Besides that," Casey says.

"I'd settle for the backseat."

"Curb check, dumbass," Casey says, tugging on his hand. His face sobers. "What do you want?" she repeats.

She can see him thinking about it for a second. "I want you not to look like that every time you think about telling them."

Casey can't see her own face, but she can imagine. "I can work on that," she says slowly. "But...as far as tonight. What do you want?"

Eyes darting to the bright windows, Derek reaches out cautiously and rubs his thumb beneath her eye, probably an attempt to fix the eye makeup that she'd messed up at Starbucks. Casey's heart trembles. "I want," he says slowly, pausing to drop his hand, "lots of things. I want...an honest life with you. That's what I want."

Casey feels a sort of shiver that she's never felt before, like a ghost has just walked right through her. But it's warm, not cold, a sort of tremor that starts in her chest and moves through her arms and shoulders and up to her head, a bone-deep shake of want and love and the deep certainty that she's found the rest of her life, standing in front of her in a jean jacket two sizes too small. "Okay," she says, swallowing thickly. "Let's try that."

Derek laughs incredulously. "Okay. Just like that?"

"Just like that," Casey says, and leads him up to the front door before anyone changes their mind. She can hear Derek still laughing at her, softly, with an air of disbelief, which only makes it easier to ring the bell. In some ways, he really is perfect for her.

"Last chance," Derek says, as they hear Jamie's distinctive shout from the other side of the door, and adult footsteps approaching. "We can still make a break for it. Hide in the bush, sneak away after they close the door."

Casey shakes her head. "I love you," she says again, which shuts him up pretty quick. He just nudges her hard with one elbow, eyes wide, and Casey beams at him until he looks away. She's gonna win a lot of arguments that way, she can already tell.

Her mother opens the door in a flourish, making them both jump, and Casey blinks a little, overwhelmed for a second by the smells from inside the house - garlic and rosemary, her mom's secret spaghetti recipe. Her stomach grumbles, suddenly reminding Casey that she hasn't eaten since this morning, and she almost doesn't notice Nora sweeping in for a hug.

"Oh my _God,_ you're _so_ late," Nora exclaims, tugging Casey in close. "We thought Derek drove you into a ditch or something! We didn't hear your car - where did you park? Oh, it's good to see you." She hugs Casey tightly, swiveling her back and forth right there on the step, and Casey clutches her mom's arm desperately, trying not to get dizzy. Derek's still laughing at her, a step behind on the porch. "Come in, come in! Where's your bags? Don't tell me you got a hotel room too?"

"I - " Casey says, breaking off to look at Derek, who shrugs. Of course he'd implied the hotel room was just for him, she thinks. Giving her an out, probably. "I'm staying at the hotel too, Mom, yeah. I just thought - Jamie's older now, he probably doesn't want to share his room, and no offense but your couch is really not made for sleeping on - "

"We have an air mattress," Nora protests, but in a sort of perfunctory way, pulling them both over the door jam. "Derek, I'd hug you again but I think you're still shell shocked from the one I gave you this morning, so I'll spare you. You're welcome."

"Thanks," Derek says belatedly, pushing the door shut behind them. In the kitchen, another shout from Jamie, with George's familiar baritone laughter underneath. Some tension in Casey's shoulders relaxes a little - this is her _family._ What _was_ she so afraid of? "Sorry we were late, I hope you guys weren't waiting on us too long. Emily and Casey, ah, got a little rowdy. Had to pull them off the bar - you should've seen her, Nora, it was a real Coyote Ugly situation - "

"Emily made mimosas," Casey interrupts, shugging ruefully at her mom. "Or maybe sangria. Maybe both, it was a real DIY effort. We got a little out of hand." She smiles. "Sorry."

Nora just laughs. "We weren't waiting. Jamie and George already ate." She shrugs and smiles at them both. "I'll eat with you two, though, if you want. Or we could just make you some plates, and you can eat in the living room while we watch a movie or something?"

"That sounds great," Casey says honestly.

"Unless you want to start cooking right away, Case? I've got all the stuff ready." Nora seems a bit distracted, tidying up through the living room as she leads them through to the kitchen, toys and sweaters and kid-sized shoes strewn about here and there. "I tried to start the chickpea dish, but I scorched them in the oven - I know, I know, I'm the worst - but I didn't touch the olives, I swear. And I've got tomatoes chopped for the bruschetta, and I bought some fancy cheese at the famer's market that I bet we could use for something - "

"Sounds great," Casey cuts her off, feeling fond and much more relaxed at her mom's babbling. Casey always forgets when she's away that Nora is just as anxious as she is, just in different ways. Why on Earth was she thinking that she'd get mad? Casey can't even handle herself sometimes, she's such a neurotic nightmare. "Yeah, sounds amazing, great, Mom. I think, uh - " she looks over at Derek, who is pointedly - dare she even say _tactfully_ \- not looking at her, hanging up his jacket on the coat stand with extreme, detailed attention. "You know, why don't I help you make up some plates for Derek and I? I can take a look at what you bought at the same time. I, um." She takes a deep breath. "I have to tell you something. I mean - I'd like to talk to you. Just for a second."

"Sure, honey," Nora says easily. Out of the corner of her eye, Casey can see Derek looking at her, his arms frozen in mid-air. "Derek, you wanna wrangle your dad and Jamie out of the kitchen? They told me they're doing dishes, but every time I go in there the mess seems to be getting bigger."

"Uh, yeah, sure," Derek says, clearing his throat conspicuously. He doesn't really look at Casey as he brushes past, and Casey feels her heart pulse with feeling for him, watching him stride out of the room determinedly, his shoulders stiff. He really does need a haircut, she thinks, narrowing her eyes at the back of his neck. Maybe she can convince him to stop on their way back home.

"Everything okay, Case?" Nora asks, once the door has swung shut behind him. "You seem...a little weird. No offense. Did you fight with Emily?"

"No," Casey says, reaching out to take her mom's hand. Nora's eyes widen in surprise, but she squeezes it automatically, the wrinkles around her eyes crinkling as she smiles at her. "I just need to tell you something, Mom. It's nothing bad, it's just...big. That's all."

"Well, I'm listening," Nora says. She smiles. "You're not moving to Argentina too, are you?"

"Nah," Casey says, bunching up her shoulders a little as she shakes off the nervousness. Man, this is gonna suck, she thinks. This is really gonna suck, but just for a little bit. Casey can see it all unfolding already, in her head, with a weird sort of clarity. "Something better than that."

"So it's good news?" Nora's shoulder seems to relax too, then, her grip loosening a little on Casey's hand.

"Yes," Casey says firmly, and takes another deep breath. Ready is a state of mind, as it turns out. "Let's get some food, okay Mom? I'm ready to talk."


End file.
